Page 31 of Gambling with the Earl
She wouldn’t stop. This was what she wanted. His eyes on her. Mayhap even his hands on her. They had sung together and laughed together. In that, he’d revealed his true soul and now she couldn’t look at his finely carved, muscular body without a hot flush of desire shooting through her.
She undid the fourth button, such a tiny thing to have such significance, and her dress fell away from her shoulders, the bodice pooling around her waist. The earl sprang to his feet in a heartbeat, arms outstretched ready to gather her towards him. She closed her eyes in delicious anticipation of his touch…
Kitty sat up in horror. Her body was flushed and damp with sweat. Darkness surrounded her and it took a moment for her to realise that she was alone in her small, narrow bedchamber.
Alone, mercifully alone.
Her breath came hard and fast. What kind of madness had infected her sleep?
She put a hand to her neck, weak with relief to find her cotton chemise still in place. It had only been a dream. But what a dream. Her mind still raced. Her body still pulsed. If only she had slept just a little longer and experienced the joy of his warm hands upon her exposed flesh…
What was she thinking?
Kitty had never expected to experience passion or desire in her life. Such emotions were for other people, not for her. She’d long closed her mind to thoughts of romance, or even companionship with any man.
Especially a man so darkly handsome as the Earl of Rossfarne.
Kitty covered her face, embarrassed by her own thoughts and the sudden spirals of her cravings. Thank goodness she’d been allocated a single servant’s room and there was no one present to witness her delirium.
She got out of bed and walked to the window, shunting open the shutters to let some fresh, sea air into the narrow chamber. She scooped up her long hair and held it away from her neck, enjoying the sudden rush of coolness. That was better. She had grown too hot in bed. Maybe that was the cause of her strange dream? That and the bewildering events of the night before.
Kitty squeezed her eyes shut. She didn’t want to remember that sudden rush of happiness when their voices had joined in unison. Nor the leap of merriment in his dark eyes or how it had felt to abandon propriety and laugh together. Those feelings had been heady, sharp and unanticipated. For a moment, she’d almost forgotten her place as a servant. It had been like bygone times at Shoreston, giggling with Rosalind over some shared nonsense, secure as part of a tight-knit duo. Except her deep affection for her sister sprang from a different place entirely to this disturbing attraction for the earl.
Enough.She clenched her hands into tight fists, exhausted by her errant thoughts, only to find a far more painful memory creeping to the fore.
Her throat constricted as she recalled the closed expression on his chiselled face when she finally sang for him properly. She’d expected praise. Nay, she’d expected something more. Hoped, even, that the man sitting before her might experience the same tumult of emotions as she. But no. He’d all but dismissed her out of hand.
Her singing hadn’t pleased him. She had the limited experience of a girl born and raised in a small fishing village, but Kitty had always been able to read people. Her skill had, to some degree, protected herself and Rosalind from the worst excessesof their father’s drinking. The Earl of Rossfarne was in some way disappointed with her. Yet he had asked for her to sing for him again. What did that mean?
She fingered the buttons of her chemise, flushing once more to think of her wanton dream-self who had undressed under his scorching gaze. She was becoming as bad as the women of ill-repute who had acquiesced to the old earl’s commands, only to be gossiped over and condemned come the next market day.
She clung to the windowsill and lowered her head to the incoming breeze, feeling once more the coolness of his appraisal.
“It was very pleasant,” he’d said. Polite and disinterested when she had given him everything.
She remembered the revealing, low-cut dresses folded away in his solar. Imagined the women who had sung for him in the past. Beautiful women, delighted to be entertaining a knight of the realm. How had she ever imagined such a man would find pleasure in a plain, domesticated creature such as she?
Why did she care so much anyway? Her only duty at Rossfarne Castle was to recover her family jewels.
Nausea churned in Kitty’s stomach. She had let herself and her sister down, revealing her lineage through her ill-advised singing. No low-born servant would know the song she had regaled him with last night. It was one she had learned from her music tutor. If the earl only put two and two together, he would surely begin to see through her falsehoods.
Nay, Kitty corrected herself. He already had. That was why he questioned her about her training. That was why he had requested her presence a second time. To confront her with the truth.
To claim her as his own.
“You belong to the Earl of Rossfarne.”
Her body began to shake so violently she feared her legs might give way beneath her. She was scared, but fear was just one of many emotions coursing through her.
Could it be that a tiny part of her wanted to be claimed?
Swallowing hard, she gripped the windowsill and wrestled away her impure thoughts. This was no good. If she couldn’t work in the castle unnoticed then she must leave. At first light. Before her subterfuge was uncovered.
Because everything had changed.
Until now, although she’d feared for her physical safety, she’d had faith in her wits and quick thinking. But if her mind were to become muddled with dark desires, who knew what traps she may walk into? Even willingly…
It was all becoming too dangerous.
